


William rescues sex slave Mike, in space

by rsadelle



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, Jonas Brothers, The Academy Is...
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Space, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-31
Updated: 2010-07-31
Packaged: 2017-10-26 20:23:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/287470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rsadelle/pseuds/rsadelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>William rescues sex slave Mike, in space.</p>
            </blockquote>





	William rescues sex slave Mike, in space

**Author's Note:**

> **Warning:** slaves and all that implies, although it's fairly mild. Also, potential death of a child.

Mike is not the pretty, pampered kind of sex slave. He's the kind that people use when they don't want to worry about not leaving marks.

Somehow William finds him and rescues him. In my head, I've always glossed over this part because I don't know how it would go and it's not the part I'm interested in.

William is part of a network that rescues slaves. Pete is the leader (as he always is in this sort of slave AU), and they're headquartered on a planet. William takes Mike there, where Pete gives him the standard "we'll support you while you figure things out, but everyone here works. You'll get paid, of course," speech.

Eventually, they figure out that Mike likes being outside, and that he likes the gardens. William has to leave, because his job is finding slaves and bringing them in, but Mike stays. Even though he has the option to go somewhere else, to make his own life on another world, Mike stays. Pete sends William regular information packets, leads on places to find people who need to be safe, and he starts including pictures of Mike.

William finds a kid, Frankie, who he brings in and suggests Pete have help Mike in the gardens when he's not in school. He thinks Frankie would like spending time outside and that Mike would like Frankie.

It works. They become friends, and Pete sends pictures of Mike laughing and Mike and Frankie holding up carrots and grinning.

One time, when William comes home and is having dinner in the large dining room, across the table from Mike, Mike says about Frankie, "He should be with his family."

William goes looking for them because it's as close as Mike has ever come to asking for something. (He's tried looking for Mike's family, but it's been too long, and there aren't records.) He finds the mother first, then news of the father's death, then one, two, three brothers. William sends them home through the network, but brings the last one, a sullen, angry boy, home himself.

Frankie's happier than William's ever seen him, and Mike keeps smiling at Frankie.

Nick, the angry one, turns out to be determined as well, and he decides they need to leave, to forge a life not steeped in slavery. William's there to watch Mike say goodbye to Frankie, and he wants to cry even though neither one of them is.

Mike stops smiling entirely.

William sits in Pete's office and spills his regrets across Pete's desk.

Pete says, "Stop it. You did a good thing, and he knows he can be happy now."

William knows that finding Frankie's family was the right thing to do, but he has a hard time remembering it when they just took him away from Mike.

Butch brings in a guy named Michael who couldn't have been a slave for very long because he doesn't hide his delight in the garden.

By the time William leaves again, Mike and Michael are working side by side in the garden, and there's a hint of a smile around Mike's lips.

Pete's messages say, "You're being an idiot," and he keeps sending pictures. In the first one where Mike's smiling again, he's in a greenhouse with Michael.

William spirals in and out around home, but he has to come back sometimes, and the next time he does, Mike smiles at him and takes him out for a tour of the gardens.

There's a rose garden, and William stands in the middle of it and turns in a slow circle to absorb it all.

"It's beautiful."

Mike nods. "Michael's been a big help." He cuts one of the roses and strips the thorns from it with one of the tools on the belt he wears. They're not just a mark of his stewardship of the garden, but also that he's a free man, with the right to carry tools that can also be used as weapons to defend himself. He gives the rose to William.

William's breath catches, and his voice is barely a whisper when he says, "Thank you."

He leaves again. He has to. Pete sends him a packet of pictures, and there's a third figure in them now, a woman. "She's from Michael's home world," Pete's note says. "Smart money is on them marrying before the year is out."

William thinks he knows what Pete is trying to tell him, but he can't let himself even hope. Mike was a sex slave, hurt and hard used. William won't do anything more to hurt him.

There's a child, a girl, in a batch of slaves William rescues, who isn't well enough to be handed off. William brings them home himself, even knowing she probably won't live.

Pete meets him at the dock, solemn and worried, as they watch the medics take the girl away. He says, "You should go see Mike."

William shakes his head. He can't, not right now. He's feeling too raw. "I'll see him at dinner," he says, and he sets out through the compound to the quarters he keeps there.

He runs into Mike in a hallway. Mike smiles when he sees him, and then it hesitates and falls off his face as he comes closer.

William dredges up a smile for him, because Mike's smiles should never fade.

"I didn't know you were coming back," Mike says. "I never know if you're coming back."

William's tired and hurting and he wants to sleep and he wants to go back out there and save others from the things he's seen people do to each other.

"I'm always coming back," he promises, but he thinks some of what he's feeling has leaked into his words.

Mike's smile comes back, softer, and he holds out his hand. "Come see the gardens. The roses are blooming again."

William takes his hand and lets Mike remind him that there is still beauty in the world.


End file.
